Building collaborative partnerships is key to success in the automotive industry - Bosch Service Solutions
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Building collaborative partnerships is key to
success in the automotive industry
April 2020
Ollie O’Donoghue, Senior Vice President, HFS Research
Tanmoy Mondal, Senior Research Analyst, HFS Research
Josh Matthews, Senior Research Analyst, HFS Research
Defining Future Business Operations
© 2020, HFS Research Ltd. | http://www.HFSresearch.com | @HFSResearch
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Embedding technology is key to success in the hyper-competitive
automotive industry
The automotive sector is as complex as it is competitive, dominated by giant companies trying to wrestle
market share away from their competitors. One way that leading brands are differentiating is by
embedding more technologies into vehicles to bring new features to customers. One major player in the
space—known for safety and security at the core of its products—wanted to embed telematics
technologies into its cars alongside a suite of services that would support customers in a range of situations,
most notably when they have an accident.
Crucially, leaders at the automotive firm recognize that telematics data and services is an area ripe for
disruption. Thin profits and outdated subscription-based business models led the team to investigate
options with leading technology firms with a simple brief: help us meet our brand promise of safety and
security in the most innovative way possible.
Enter Bosch Service Solutions, which, with decades of experience in the automotive space, was able to
package deep domain expertise alongside an experienced bench of IT and contact center professionals. It
also provided the global scale required by its client, which had the ambitious initial roadmap to implement
the solution in all its vehicles across all of the markets it served. A bonus was that Bosch offered flexible
pricing for its telematics services. In the industry, it is conventional to offer telematics services to end-
customers on a subscription basis. However, as the automotive firm wanted to offer its customers
telemetry services as standard, Bosch developed an innovative fixed-cost model.
“We selected Bosch because of their deep domain experience, advanced
IT skills, and call center capabilities.”
—Business leader, major automotive firm
According to Bosch and its client’s leadership team, theirs was the first partnership to develop and test
Bosch’s eCall solution, a suite of solutions integrating telematics technologies in the vehicle with other
services. In an accident, the system alerts one of Bosch’s contact centers to provide the necessary support
to the driver; this feature, according to the project team, isn’t always initially valued by customers, but it
certainly is if an incident occurs. Candidly, executives from the automotive firm advised, “Most customers
don’t realize we’ve embedded eCall into their vehicle until they have an accident—but certainly value it
when they need it. And it often leads to them ordering a new vehicle from us.”
The automotive leadership team articulated the importance of building a real collaborative partnership
with Bosch to the overall success of the project. Uncharacteristically for partnerships in the automotive
market, it has been working with Bosch for over a decade, and it has rolled out eCall in 53 countries,
leveraging eCall’s 18 supported languages. A vital characteristic Bosch was able to bring to such a large and
lengthy engagement was scale and, paradoxically, an almost start-up level of agility. According to the client,
its customers expect the automaker to be the first in the market with any critical innovation. This led to
some interesting tests of the partnership when, for example, a nation changed its regulatory environment
for telematics devices in cars just a few weeks before a planned rollout. Bosch and its client were able to
2 © 2020, HFS Research Ltd.
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evolve the solution to meet the new regulations without delay. The automotive leadership team
highlighted this as a real strength of Bosch and a major factor in the success of the partnership; “We simply
have to be the first to market with innovation like this—and Bosch was able to bring the scale and agility
necessary to do this.”
“The one thing that stood out for us is their people—they love their jobs!”
—Business leader, major automotive firm
Of course, an engagement like this always boils down to one thing: the quality of the people on the team.
According to the automotive leadership team, the people that Bosch was able to bring to the engagement
really made the difference—they were highly motivated and engaged, and they helped drive the ambitious
partnership forward. At the time, the client was one of the first to implement the Bosch solution, but,
eventually, more firms in the market leveraged the now tried-and tested-model, which is a testament to
the partnership’s commitment to innovation in the space. The client executive leading the engagement
noted, “We did a lot of trial and error across our telematics solutions, but in the end, eCall is an unrivaled
solution—with a strong roadmap ahead.”
As the partnership evolves, Bosch and its clients plan to expand into other areas. The core solution sits with
accident response and recovery, but in some markets, the value is extended to customers through a high-
touch concierge service—a weapon in the arsenal of automotive firms looking to attract clients in a
competitive market, and, in the case of the company in this report, a highly-valued addition helping it cater
to premium customers.
The Bottom Line: Finding a partner with the talent, technology, and
approach to solve a major industry challenge is hard—so automotive
leaders must find and keep the partners that are right for them.
By the client’s own admission, building such a long-term and successful partnership in the automotive
space is rare, which makes it vital for leaders in the space to find real partners that have the talent,
expertise, and capability to solve real industry challenges. The success of this engagement with Bosch in the
words of their clients is simple: “The technology is right, the business model is right, and we’re growing
how we use the solution.” And with a raft of fresh business cases being mulled over by leaders on the buy-
side and supply-side, it’s likely we’ll see more from this exciting partnership.
3 © 2020, HFS Research Ltd.
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HFS Research authors
Ollie O’Donoghue | Senior Vice President
Ollie O’Donoghue is responsible for HFS’ IT Services and Talent Management research
areas. Using his background in Enterprise IT, he helps drive a holistic research agenda
aimed at helping enterprises make the right business decisions.
Tanmoy Mondal| Senior Research Analyst
Tanmoy Mondal is Senior Research Analyst at HFS, with over 7 years’ experience in
enterprise and emerging technology areas. His coverage areas include Manufacturing,
Industry 4.0, and Blockchain. He is based out of the HFS India office in Bangalore.
Josh Matthews | Senior Research Analyst
Josh Matthews is a Senior Research Analyst at HFS Research, based in Cambridge following
a Master’s programme covering Engineering Management at Cambridge University’s
Institute for Manufacturing (IfM). His research tackled operational and environmental
improvements in industry, and the implementation and management of sustainable
initiatives.
4 © 2020, HFS Research Ltd.
29j5bg37The HFS Research team would also like to thank the Bosch Solution Services team who supported and
collaborated with us on this report.
About Bosch Service Solutions
Bosch Service Solutions is a leading provider for Business Process Outsourcing. We help to optimize service
offerings in five key areas: Customer Experience Services, Mobility Services, Monitoring Services, as well as
Business Services and Shared Services. We also work with our customers to develop, implement and
operate new business models.
The Mobility cluster is one of the fastest growing sectors. In this environment we offer differentiated
services for the maximum convenience and safety of your customers – from emergency and breakdown
services through personal assistance systems such as Remote and Concierge Services to the fast, reliable
tracking of stolen vehicles.
We have a unique set of competencies based on our values, our technology and integration competence, as
well as our comprehensive experience and know-how of communication processes.
Brand and values
As part of the Bosch Group, Bosch Service Solutions stands for a reliable partnership, an international
network and the highest standards of quality and data security in our services.
Expertise in technology and system integration
We focus on certain sectors and services in order to offer highly innovative solutions - and we have reached
leading positions in the areas of automotive/mobility, sensor technology and Internet of Things. We are
helping our customers to exploit the full potential of a connected future.
Communications and process expertise
Through our long-term partnerships with our customers we are able to develop tailored services and
technologies. You and your end customers benefit from an excellent service experience that covers all
needs
5 © 2020, HFS Research Ltd.
29j5bg37About HFS Research: Defining future
business operations
The HFS mission is to provide visionary insight into major
innovations impacting business operations, including:
automation, artificial intelligence, blockchain, Internet of
things, digital business models, and smart analytics.
HFS defines and visualizes the future of business operations
across key industries with our Digital OneOffice™ Framework.
HFS influences the strategies of enterprise customers to help
them develop OneOffice backbones to be competitive and to
partner with capable services providers, technology suppliers,
and third-party advisors.
Read more about HFS and our initiatives on
www.HFSresearch.com or follow @HFSResearch.
6 © 2020, HFS Research Ltd.
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